Sweden: Fossil fuel-free steel

Sweden has started construction on a factory that will test whether steel can be made without burning fossil fuels.

Utility firm Vattenfall – led by managing director and CEO Magnus Hall, pictured – has teamed up with steel company SSAB and mining firm LKAB to build the U.S. $158 million pilot plant.

Existing plants produce large amounts of carbon dioxide, a greenhouse gas, when coal is used to turn iron into hardened steel.

The new factory being built in the northeastern town of Lulea by 2020 will use hydrogen instead of coal and coke, which is a solid fuel made by heating coal. The companies’ joint venture, called HYBRIT, aims to have an industrial process in place by 2035, Vattenfall said in June 2018.